From WSJopinion: To doubt a scientist is not to doubt science, writes Gary Saul Morson. Quite the contrary, personal authority is precisely what science dispenses with, as much as possible.
Oct. 11, 2021 1:18 pm ET
Medieval thinkers pretending to infallibility often claimed to have received a direct revelation from God. Since the 19th century, secular thinkers have invoked science. As Anthony Fauci said in June, “a lot of what you’re seeing as attacks on me, quite frankly are attacks on science.” One can often tell that an appeal to science is unwarranted without knowing anything about the science in question. If science is treated as a solid block, each part of which is as indubitable as all the others, then science has been misunderstood. Science always contains some propositions less firmly grounded than others: on the frontier, newly discovered, based on experiments not readily replicated.
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